is a democrat, is apparently making calls to gauge interest in north carolina's second district. that is it for me. i'm brooke baldwin. you can always check out our interviews. go to the brooke blog, cnn.com/brooke. let's send things to washington to jake tapper. "the lead" starts right now. tens of millions of americans affected by the blizzard. if you're snowed in, i hope you have more than stale candy canes in your cupboard. i'm jake tapper. this is "the lead." the national lead. it is a great day to be out there hurling snowballs if you can feel your fingers inside your gloves. one giant snow day, for as much as a third of the country, but will we get any relief from this bitter cold? also in national news, police let a man go and now they say he killed a beloved california priest just hours later. why was this member of the clergy targeted? we'll ask one of the people who knew him best. and the politics lead. his indefinite suspension lasted a very definite nine days but

could the uproar over remarks on gays and race by "duck dynasty"'s pate reyar spell trouble in some ways for republicans for a lot longer than nine days? hello, everyone. i'm jake tapper. welcome to "the lead." we begin with the national lead. perhaps daniel malloy said it best. don't accept any dares to put your tongue on a flagpole today. temperatures across a wide swath of the country is only fit for penguins, with highs in the teens in part of the northeast following a massive snowstorm that affected as many as 100 million americans. it looks like the end of "the shining." remember that snow-covered maze? anyway, if you're snowbound, please keep in mind that all work and no play makes jack a dull boy. air travel is crippled, with more than 2500 flights canceled today on top of the 2600 that were canceled yesterday. take a look at this. it's the first plane to land at new york's jfk airport after it reopened this morning.

how would you like to look out your passenger window and see that runway coming up? the cold extends throughout the midwest. check out this picture from nasa showing the ice forming over lake erie. it's like a giant rink. boston saw some of the worst of the storm, with anywhere from 10 to 18 inches of snow in parts and temperatures that could drop as low as six degrees by tonight. it's a town accustomed to the cold, of course, but the people there have to be pretty thankful that their patriots have this icy weekend off. margaret conley is standing by in boston. a lot of shovel work to be done there today. >> reporter: that's right, jake. there has been up to two feet of snow in parts of massachusetts. you can see all the way down the street, people are shoveling bit by bit, slowly, and it is also freezing cold. there's a wind chill factor, wind chill advisory until 9:00 a.m. tomorrow morning. we are with katie and jared. what a pain this is to have to keep doing this all day

yesterday and today, right? >> it gets a little tiring, especially in the cold. >> reporter: you guys didn't even have a car last year but you still had to shovel? tell us about that. >> yeah. we just helped out one of our neighbors last year. it was much worse than this. much more of a blizzard. last night was really bad. >> reporter: it's part of the culture, too. like once you shovel out your spot, it's yours, right? no one else can take claim to it? tell us about that. >> oh, yeah, especially in southie, it's a big deal. everyone has their space savers and you better respect it or you might come back to find your tires aren't exactly inflated anymore. >> reporter: all right. the good news here is that the airports seem to be up and running again, flights seem to be on time. we have seen flights take off and land from logan. jake? >> stay warm. you can see the bitter cold. she's putting a good face on there. in new york city, the snow and ice presented the first major challenge for newly sworn in mayor bill de blasio. the mayor himself was spotted

this morning working a snow shovel. let's bring in gail brewer, manhattan borough president. when was the last time you remember it being so cold in new york city? >> a very long time. i don't even remember exactly when. the last snowstorm's weren't as cold. it's really the wind and the cold that's the challenge today. >> we appreciate you standing out in that cold to talk to us. tell us what road and street conditions are like in the city right now. >> the street conditions are pretty good. i talked to all community boards from one end of manhattan to the other, and the streets are shoveled. at 8:00 this morning, laborers started shoveling the curb cuts and the bus stops which are very important for manhattan. but our problem with the cold is the lack of heat and hot water in some of the buildings. that's an issue. and we have about 2,000 complaints that came in to the housing agency, and maybe, you know, 400 buildings in manhattan right now that have heat and hot water complaints. that's a lot.

>> so this is mayor de blasio's first big crisis. what grade would you give him, the first big snow crisis he's had? >> in manhattan, in terms of the snow plowing, i give hm an "a" because i have had no complaints from any of my community boards about the lack of snow plowing. it's all been plowed. >> there's a good chance you know that it could drop below zero tonight but what help are you providing to people who may be homeless or those 2,000 you mentioned who may be without heat? >> the issue there is the hundred extra inspectors are on at the housing agency to go to the buildings and try to get the heat turned on. that's what we're going to follow up on, is over the weekend, even talking to the housing agency, and where they have identified manhattan buildings, we will go to them and try to work with the tenants to assure that they're okay. >> go get some hot chocolate. thank you so much. >> thank you very much. even if you're the type who

usually thinks snow, schmo, your tune might change once you actually step outside and feel the bitter cold this storm system left behind. we're talking wind chills as low as minus 25 in places like boston and in the midwest, a frigid minus 47. it should be a lot of fun making snow angels when your eyelids are frozen shut. joining us now to talk about this dangerously cold weather is cnn chief medical correspondent, dr. sanjay gupta. good to see you. what kinds of risks do people face when the temperatures drop as low as they're getting and as low as we will see them in parts of the midwest and northeast tonight? >> well, the two big ones, as you might expect, are hypothermia and frostbite. the thing about when you talk about these conditions, they can occur at varying temperatures and different people are going to be susceptible but as a general rule of thumb, when you talk about some of the temperatures that we're talking about, negative 30 at that football game, for example, on sunday with the wind chill, in as little as 15 minutes, you can

start to develop frostbite so just an exposed part of the skin can develop that problem pretty quickly. they talk about this idea of layering, loosely layering clothes to keep warm air trapped inside, wearing a hat because 20% of your body heat is lost through your head, making sure you eat a big meal because eating actually helps generate heat, body heat, whereas drinking alcohol has the opposite effect. so there are some golden rules here. but to your question, it can happen pretty quickly. >> just to be clear, you would recommend, if a patient came to you and said i got tickets to the green bay/49ers game on sunday, and you would say don't go? >> well, i mean, i think i personally probably would not go to a game like that. i think it's going to be probably not that pleasant for people who are out there the entire time. if you do go, look, dating back to the ice bowl, we didn't have very good material and very good technology to keep people warm. we can do that a lot better nowadays with gortex and various

types of materials. i would go inside a fair amount as well. get inside to the heated bathroom areas, outside of the wind chill in particular every so often. i'm not sure that i would go but i think you can do it safely if you do go. >> this time of year doesn't just bring weather concerns. we are also at the peak of flu season. the cdc reporting a big jump in widespread flu activity in half the country. what does that mean? should we be more concerned than normal? >> i don't think so, jake. you may remember last year about this time, we were reporting on a much more aggressive flu season at this time. it was almost double the activity in some of these states. you had half the country reporting widespread flu activity and it's high in about 20 states. again, it was almost double that last year. what i would say, this is i think important, you remember we were talking about h1n1 quite a bit back in 2009, a novel virus, a virus that a lot of people had never been exposed to before. well, now it's the predominant circulating virus. it's what's causing the flu in a lot of people.

the way this works is you get a flu shot, you will get some protection, but for people out there who have never had a flu shot, they may have some immunity just from having been alive for so many years, but kids, especially young kids, may have never been exposed to h1n1 before. if they haven't received a flu shot, they may be particularly susceptible to this. so i think what all that means is i think a flu shot especially in the young people is more important than it was in recent years past. >> not too late to get a flu shot. dr. sanjay gupta, thank you so much. >> you got it, jake. thank you. coming up on "the lead," a priest is killed and the man police believe did it was in their custody just hours before the murder. how did it happen? and the ripple effect from the controversial comments made by a star of "duck dynasty." it keeps coming. we'll explain.

if yand you're talking toevere rheuyour rheumatologistike me, about trying or adding a biologic. this is humira, adalimumab. this is humira working to help relieve my pain. this is humira helping me through the twists and turns. this is humira helping to protect my joints from further damage. doctors have been prescribing mira for over ten years. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to ra symptoms. for many adults, humira is proven to help relieve pain and stop further joint damage. humira can lower your ability to fight infections, including tuberculosis. serious, sometimes fatal events, such as infections, lymphoma, or other types of cancer, have happened. blood, liver and nervous system problems, serious allergic reactions, and new or worsening heart failure have occurred. before starting humira , your doctor should test you for tb.

ask your doctor if you live in or have been to a region where certain fungal infections are common. tell your doctor if you have had tb, hepatitis b, are prone to infections, or have symptoms such as fever, fatigue, cough, or sores. you should not start humira if you have any kind of infection. ask your doctor if humira can work for you. this is humira at work. humans -- even when we cross our "t's" and dot our "i's," we still run into problems. that's why liberty mutual insurance offers accident forgiveness with our auto policies. if you qualify, your rates won't go up due to your first accident. because making mistakes is only human, and so are we. we also offer new car replacement, so if you total your new car, we give you the money for a new one. call liberty mutual insurance at... and ask us all about our auto features, like guaranteed repairs, where if you get into an accident

and use one of our certified repair shops, your repairs are guaranteed for life. so call... to talk with an insurance expert about everything that comes standard with our base auto policy. and if you switch, you could save up to $423. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? welcome back to "the lead." in other national news, just hours before a beloved priest was beaten to death inside his church rectory, police say his killer was in their custody. gary lee bullock was arrested in california yesterday and charged in the murder of reverend eric freed. the motive for the murder is still unclear, but police think it was a crime of opportunity. reverend freed was found dead inside st. bernard parish church on new year's day around 9:00 a.m. police say there were clear signs a struggle took place, while they're still trying to piece together exactly what happened. police do know the accused killer had a run-in with the law

hours before the murder. bullock had been arrested for public intoxication. he was moved from the jail to the hospital, where he had to be physically restrained, according to police, but they released him eight hours later. he was then spotted hanging around st. bernard church, where police confronted him but did not take him in. a short time later, someone matching bullock's description was spotted around the church again. it was not long after that when the reverend's body was found. he is being remembered as someone who dedicated his life to serving his community not only as a priest but as a teacher at a local college. steven kunya joins us now, he worked closely with the reverend at the university and joins us via skype. our condolences on the loss of your friend. you got to know reverend freed both personally and professionally. you say he had a unique ability to connect with people on a deeper level. what was it about reverend freed that drew people to him? >> you know, he lived his

values. the things he preached from the pulpit and in the classroom, he lived. he was very concerned about social injustice, resolving great social inequalities which we see here in our small community, where both the rich and the middle class and those that are less fortunate sort of all live together in the same community and share the same streets and the same stores and the same parks, and often the same neighborhoods and schools. so he was one who was really concerned about these inequities and he not only preached and taught about ways to resolve them but also not prejudging people. that was the real outstanding quality that he had. i think it resonated with both the parish goers and the students. >> when it came to bridging that gap in your small community, and his attempts to bring people together, how did he do that?

>> well, it was largely through the power of persuasion and the things he talked about from the pulpit and the classroom. the idea that for those who were well-off and not struggling, to be open to those who were and not prejudge them, and to think about their issues and try to work to make our institutions better to resolve some of these inequities. especially with young students, most of our students, it's a residential campus, most are in their 20s. to think about this going forward, that these issues are not going to go away in their lifetimes and they are going to, you know, they are in a position to help resolve them as people that are well educated and often on the top are. >> we know so little about the man accused of the reverend freed's murder. but based on what we do know, is he the kind of person that the reverend freed would go out of his way to try to help? >> i think he would have, yes. certainly the way he ran his ministry and the way often that

he allowed people who were downtrodden and perhaps not in a great space to use the facilities. he might have very well invited him in. he did invite people in. he realized i think that that was a double-edged sword. i talked to him about that once. but i don't know anything else about this fellow, any more than you do. it's just a terrible, you know, unfortunate incident that happened. >> when you say you talked to the reverend freed about it being a double-edged sword, allowing individuals from let's say rougher backgrounds in to his community, what was his response? did you express concern? how did it come up? >> well, it came up one time during a conversation we actually had in this office and he was, you know, talking about the fact that he used his facilities to help people out at times when they really needed it. he realized that there was sometimes a risk involved in that, but he had a way to

monitor it and he also used i think the power of his personality to address some of those issues. but that's an area that i really am not an expert on, but i know and others knew that he used his church facilities as a homeless shelter at times when it was really necessary. >> it's a real tragedy. our hearts go out to you and all of his friends and family. thank you so much. >> okay. you're welcome. a mother who vowed to do whatever it takes to keep doctors from pulling the plug on her little girl scored a small but significant victory. just hours ago, the family of 13-year-old jahi mcmath reached an agreement with her hospital on how she can be moved. jahi has been on a ventilator at children's hospital in oakland since december 12th. she suffered cardiac arrest and was declared brain dead following a tonsillectomy and a procedure to remove sinus tissue. the hospital, and independent medical experts all agree jahi is medically dead. today the coroner issued a death certificate but her family still

has hope and they want her moved to a different facility, where she can remain hooked to a breathing machine. under the new agreement with the family children's hospital said it would work with whatever facility the family finds, but the hospital won't perform any medical procedures to prepare jahi's body for the transfer. the family says it can provide an outside doctor but the name of that doctor and jahi's potential new long term care facility have not been released. a court ordered that jahi be kept on the ventilator until january 7th. let's check in on our political panel in the green room. "duck dynasty" are putting their name on a line of guns featuring the duck commander logo and the tag line "faith, family, ducks." you can add the guns to your collection of licensed books, devotionals, pencils, holiday albums, chia pets. any gear under your tree this christmas? >> no. but i got all my presents from

"storage wars." >> coming up, what the flap says about the politics of the gop. stay with us.

[poof!] [beep] [clicks mouse] nice office. how you doing? good. automatic discounts the moment you sign up.

welcome back to "the lead." in the politics lead, quack, quack. the cast of "duck dynasty" is back at work making duck calls and pulling pranks on each other, shooting their fifth season of the hit reality show for a & e. the cable network reinstated family patriarch phil robertson after suspended him, kind of, over comments he made to "gq" magazine suggesting that african

americans in the deep south seemed happier to him before the civil rights era and arguing that homosexuality is a sin as his faith teaches. on thursday, we learned the family is now lending their name to a new brand of firearms. listen to this pitch from phil robertson in the latest mossberg ad which seems to be selling a vision of america as much as the guns. >> we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal and they have been endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. those are rights that no government can take from you. to live, be free and pursue happiness. you know what makes me happy, ladies and gentlemen? to blow a mallard drake's head smooth off. >> i recognize the first part of that but not the last part. robertson's cause was taken up by conservative republicans from senator ted cruz to louisiana governor bobby jindal, speaking out on fox news channel.

>> that's what's so great about america. you don't have to agree with everybody, but everybody's got a right to their opinion, especially a religious opinion. >> now that the clan is back in action, should we write off this whole thing as just another silly media flap? well, one liberal columnist argues that the controversy is the most important political debate of the year, revealing a problem that haunts the republican party. here to help us take aim at the continuing political implications of this story is our panel. republican strategist kristen anderson and brian boytler, who wrote the "duck dynasty" column and chief washington correspondent for yahoo! news, olivea knox. you wrote, quote, phil robertson's comments about gay and black people on social welfare and the way they pierce public consciousness explain more about our country's political culture than almost anything else that happened all year. unpack this for us. >> i actually want to start with

something senator lindsay graham said after the 2012 election which is that the country wasn't making enough angry white people to sustain the party in the form it took in president obama's first term. that means, you know, their policies needed to be reshaped and their public communications couldn't, you know, continue the same way they had in the four previous years. implicit in what he said was that the party depended to a great extent on people who think and believe things that phil robertson believes in, so it has to represent their views in certain ways, their policy views, their political views, how they think about the country culturally, and unfortunately, for them, lots of things phil robertson said and believe and people like him say and believe don't fly in much of the country. so they have this tension where they need to represent the views of people like phil robertson without letting people like phil robertson sort of be a mouthpiece for their party. i believe that that problem is going to manifest itself over the next year, over the next two or three years as the party tries to reshape itself.

>> you're a republican pollster. is there any validity to what he's saying? >> this isn't a new dynamic. you had archie bunker republicans going back to the '70s and south park republicans throughout the 2000s. this idea there's a tension between what the party's brand should be and defensive political incorrectness has been there for decades. the challenge for republicans is there's this demographic issue of how much of the archie bunker votes is still there for them. but this issue isn't just about conservative republicans. nbc esquire about a survey last fall, the new american center. it actually found about a third of people in that new american center are anxious about the changing demographics of america which is sort of a politically incorrect view to hold, that lots of people don't hold the views that phil robertson had to that extent of the really offensive things, but know that they may believe one or two things that if they were to go out and say them, they wouldn't want to get fired over it. i think that's what's caused a lot of these republican folks to jump out.

it's just another round of the whole -- the tension between republicans having a politically incorrect segment of their party and wanting to fight against political correctness as a doctrine. >> it's a fascinating episode in the ongoing relationship between politicians and the media. politicians will go where the eyeballs are. for a lot of them who may be eyeing a national run in 2016, what better way to get a springboard to national prominence, albeit for the flick of an eyelid than to latch on to this thing. bobby jindal gave the answer to the state of the union some years ago but has kind of flown under the radar since. this is great for him. politicians will do things like advertise on live sporting events because people don't dvr those and skip the ads. the president will refer to big bird after his disastrous first debate because entertainment outlets focused on the big bird comments and millions of americans get their information from the outlets. >> it's not just grabbing the issue of the day, december had a lot of news holes, and it's not

just that. you point out that a lot of these guys, jindal, cruz, they didn't embrace the comments. they didn't say i agree with the comments. >> what i would say, what was interesting about what jindal and cruz said is that, you know, politics, political media is obsessed with sister soldier moments when a party leader or party figureheads look at the base of their party and say no, that's actually going too far. they had a real golden opportunity, the republican party, ted cruz, bobby jindal, had a real opportunity to do something like that, to say actually you know what, as much as we want people to have the right to say what they want in public forum, that goes too far. you don't necessarily get to keep your job if you, in the workplace, say things that are that passe or that out of step with the culture at large. and i think that's the problem for them. they are going to have to find new and interesting ways sort of to like defend people who support their party without

actually vouchsafing any of their views. >> politico had a piece that talked about the divide in the republican party on social issues between fund-raisers, the people who were behind the autopsy of the republican party a year ago or so, and others, and the base of the party. frank cannon from american principles project said quote, the manhattan and california zip codes where large numbers of these donors come from don't behave politically or have the same views as western ohio, so there's a distortion of the political views by the donor class and by the consultant class. fair? >> i would say that if you did, took a random sample of republican consultants, that the views are probably different than a random sample of republican voters but i think that if you look broadly, there are some very clear trend lines on certain social issues, not all of them. i think sometimes they get unfairly lumped into one bucket. that just show that america is changing very rapidly in a lot of ways. demographic

demographically in terms of our views of gay rights and because of that, the republican party is trying to figure out how to keep up. some are trying to figure it out, others are opposing it. i think that in the end, everybody loves a winner and it's going to take a candidate who holds views that particularly on issues of gay rights that are more inhe mainstream and really win that will get more and more people -- that will get more energy behind that side of the party. >> i want to give you the last word. >> i thought the most interesting thing was actually the fact they didn't embrace the content of the remarks. that suggests to me that tension, it suggests to me the republican intraparty re-evaluation, it's something to watch going forward. >> they said they have the right to say this, people shouldn't be discriminated against because of their religious views, but you didn't hear bobby jindal say yes, absolutely african-americans before the civil rights era were happier in the deep south. thank you so much. in other political news, one year after the post-newtown push on gun control began, the white house has announced two proposed

rule changes to improve the federal background check system to keep guns out of the hands of those who are deemed mentally ill. the department of justice will work to clarify rules involving forcible commitments to mental institutions. they want to add both in-patient and out-patient forcible commitments to the system that already prohibits felons from legally owning a gun. also, the department of health and human services is proposing a new regulation to try and overcome hurdles and privacy laws with what health care providers can disclose to the background checks system. hhs says simply seeking health for mental health problems and getting care does not prohibit someone from getting a gun. an independent review panel urged president obama to stop letting the nsa collect americans' phone records in a massive data base. how did the government respond? by getting the secret fisa court to renew that authority today. at least they're telling us about it now. the director of national intelligence has declassified the fisa court's ruling. last month, one federal court judge ruled that bulk collection probably violates the constitution but another federal judge ruled that it doesn't, so

there's a chance that the supreme court will ultimately get involved. coming up on "the lead," if the packers win a playoff game, and no one is there to see it, does it still count? the tricks the nfl is pulling to make it seem like their stadiums are selling out, in our sports lead. in our pop culture lead, your dvr is about to be overloaded with all the shows coming back in january. we will tell you what to keep and what to delete, coming up. ♪ [ male announcer ] this is the story of the little room over the pizza place at 315 chestnut street. the modest first floor bedroom in tallinn, estonia and the dusty basement at 1406 35th street. it is the story of the old dining room table at 25th and hoffman avenue. the southbound bus barreling down i-95. ...and the second floor above the strip mall at roble and el camino. ♪ this magic moment it is the story of where every great idea begins. ♪ so different and so new where those with endless vision

and an equal amount of audaciousness believed they had the power to do more. time and time again. ♪ and then, it happened at dell, we're honored to be part of some of the world's great stories. stories that began much the same way ours did. in a little dorm room -- # 2713. ♪ this magic moment ♪ kand i don't have time foris morunreliable companies.b angie's list definitely saves me time and money. for over 18 years we've helped people take care of the things that matter most. join today. so ally bank has a that won't trap me in a rate. that's correct. cause i'm really nervous about getting trapped. why's that? uh, mark? go get help!

i have my reasons. look, you don't have to feel trapped with our raise your rate cd. if our rate on this cd goes up, yours can too. oh that sounds nice. don't feel trapped with the ally raise your rate cd. ally bank. your money needs an ally. [ chainsaw whirring ] humans -- sometimes life trips us up. sometimes we trip ourselves up. and although the mistakes may seem to just keep coming at you, so do the solutions. like multi-policy discounts from liberty mutual insurance. save up to 10% just for combining your auto and home insurance. call liberty mutual insurance at... [ thump ] to speak with an insurance expert

and ask about all the personalized savings available for when you get married, move into a new house, or add a car to your policy. personalized coverage and savings. all the things humans need to make our world a little less imperfect. call... and ask about all the ways you could save. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy? welcome back to "the lead." time for the sports lead. let the cheeseheads have their pigskin just in the nick of time this afternoon, the green bay packers announced they have indeed sold out sunday's playoff game against the 49ers with a little help from corporate sponsors who scooped up remaining seats. the team was facing a deadline of 4:00 p.m. central time, little more than half an hour from now, to sell out before the game was blacked out in the green bay and milwaukee markets, which would have meant fans,

probably, wouldn't be able to watch the game in their own living rooms. thankfully for them it's not going to happen but it is a troubling trend for the nfl. one that is now even hit the frozen tundra of lambeau field and the league's most storied franchise. as of this morning there were still plenty of seats available in cincinnati, too, where players even recorded an ad urging fans to show up. >> the road to the super bowl starts here in the jungle. >> and we want you with us. it's the playoffs. it's our time. >> we need you here with us. >> i'm sorry. due respect to cincinnati, but that's sad. espn reports that the indianapolis colts, who play in a brand new dome, finally sold out their game this morning, but only after a sponsor purchased the final 1200 seats and donated them to military families. joining me now to try to figure this all out is "the washington post" sports columnist mike wise. as sanjay said earlier, it will be very, very cold in green bay, maybe even negative 30. is that the reason they had trouble selling out? >> clearly, dr. sanjay gupta

does not work for the nfl. you're telling people to stay home. >> not sponsored by the nfl. >> if i listened to him i would stop eating deep-fried twinkies. i'm not going to do that. it does bring up a larger question. how much foolproof is the nfl as a commodity. if freezing temperatures, if maybe not the greatest stars in the world are playing this weekend, peyton manning's not playing this weekend, what does it say about your product long term? i think it says simply this. football ticket sales, sponsorship, viewership's not going to go away. but the game viewing experience at home is so good now, i don't know if you have -- i know you're a big eagles fan. you ever been to cowboys stadium? the new one? >> no. >> you watch the scoreboard, jerry jones' scoreboard, more than you do the game on the field. when you're at the game. and i think the viewing experience, the comfort of your own home, the food, everything, the angles, the announcers, if they're not annoying.

that experience is now trumping in-person games for a lot of people. >> i will admit, i was teasing some packers fans on twitter today and they responded with good humor for the most part, but here were the reasons i was given for the fact they had not yet sold out at that point. one, too cold. although in indianapolis, they had trouble selling out. and that's an indoor stadium. >> yeah. anybody who was at almost the ice bowl ii, the giants nfc championship game a few years ago, there wasn't a seat to be had at lambeau field and there were more freezing temperatures than in 30 years in the nfl. >> so the other thing, too expensive, they said. the tickets are too expensive. are the owners pricing their fans out of the market? >> that's a very fair point. the fact that they had to put party decks in at fedex field says everything about washington. washington was a foolproof fan base for a long time. it can't get the numbers that it does and it's because it's

priced some fans out. you got the luxury box and the corporate set that will pay anyway, but there are people that won't sit, if they don't get a lower bowl seat that's right if not the 30 to 50 yard line, why would you pay upwards of $100 to sit way upstairs? i completely agree with anybody that wants to shake their fist at the nfl and say enough, already, we know your product's good, we know it's part of american culture, we're not going to pay these prices. >> there was a third reason i didn't had to do with playoff tickets being on sale when the team was 5-6. i don't want to go into that. what can nfl owners do, if anything, to put butts back in the seats so we don't have, i'm sorry, but that cincinnati ad, it was sad. it was sad. >> it was. my wife's from cincinnati and that city is not -- when they've hosted a playoff game, they haven't done very well. people should be enthralled that their team is in the playoffs and they should show up. the only thing owners can do, tell you what, unless the super bowl turns into one of the great

games of all time, i'm wondering what the fan experience will be like in new york during cold weather times. i'm not saying everybody should build a dome. i'm not saying cold weather cities should not be cold weather cities. bottom line is, there's too many entertainment dollars that you can spend elsewhere in sports now to say that the nfl is going to be king no matter what, irrespective of temperature, of how much it costs to park somewhere. at some point you got to lower some prices. >> if you owned a team, if you were that rich, you would have an indoor stadium? sounds like it to me. >> yes. i can't ask people, even people that grew up in the cold -- green bay is one of the greatest -- the fact that lambeau field had trouble selling out seats, green bay is one of the greatest places to ever see a game in your life. they have ramblers of people who put up signs saying $10 to park here and use the bathroom. these are the people of green

bay. they should be at their game. >> they are some of the most loyal fans in the united states, as i learned first-hand on twitter today. i did it on purpose to get them to watch. thank you. we appreciate it. coming up on "the lead" is al qaeda in the middle of a comeback? osama bin laden is gone but the terrorist group still had a very good 2013. that's our world lead. later, broadway says good-bye to one of its most overhyped shows. that's saying a lot. what super poligrip does for me is it keeps the food out. before those little pieces would get in between my dentures and my gum and it was uncomfortable. [ male announcer ] just a few dabs is clinically proven to seal out more food particles. [ corrine ] super poligrip is part of my life now. [ male announcer ] with nearly 7 million investors... oh hey, neill, how are you? [ male announcer ] ...you'd expect us to have a highly skilled call center. kevin, neill holley's on line one.

ok, great. [ male announcer ] and we do. it's how edward jones makes sense of investing. crestor got more high-risk patients' bad cholesterol to a goal of under 100. way to go, crestor! yeah! getting to goal is a big deal, especially if you have high cholesterol plus any of these risk factors. because you could be at increased risk for plaque buildup in your arteries over time. so, when diet and exercise aren't enough to lower cholesterol,

adding crestor can help. go, crestor! ♪ ♪ oh, yeah [ female announcer ] crestor is not right for everyone, like people with liver disease or women who are nursing, pregnant, or may become pregnant. tell your doctor about other medicines you're taking. call your doctor right away if you have muscle pain or weakness, feel unusually tired, have loss of appetite, upper belly pain, dark urine, or yellowing of skin or eyes. these could be signs of rare but serious side effects. crestor! yes! [ female announcer ] ask your doctor about crestor. if you can't afford your medication, astrazeneca may be able to help.

welcome back to "the lead." i'm jake tapper. time for our world lead. remember when al qaeda was supposedly on the path to defeat? president obama probably does. he mentioned it a few times in the 2012 campaign. >> al qaeda's on the path to defeat. >> al qaeda's on the path to defeat. >> path to defeat. >> path to defeat. >> now in 2013, the president tried to clarify those many, many, many remarks, saying he was talking about al qaeda's core leadership. but now we may be seeing a resurgence of al qaeda in iraq, a country that was supposed to be stable enough for the u.s. to leave on december 18th, 2011, when the last u.s. combat troops pulled out. the "new york times" is reporting the radical sunni militants with links to al qaeda are threatening to overtake fallujah and ra madi, two cities where many troops lost their lives. just today, at least 80 people were killed in clashes in anwar province. the u.n. reports that in 2013,

nearly 8,000 civilians and more than 1,000 members of iraqi security forces were killed in iraq. the highest death toll there in five years. let's talk about this with the director at the center for the study of terrorist radicalization. you wrote an article a few days ago called "al qaeda's big year" and are we talking about the core leadership of al qaeda, talking about these affiliates, even more loosely affiliated groups? what do you mean by al qaeda's big year? >> when i say they had a big year i'm talking about affiliates that are recognized affiliates. that is, they took an oath of loyalty to al qaeda, one that was accepted by the central leadership. frankly, the status of the central leadership is something about which there's a lot of debate but not a lot of visibility. we know there has been a great deal of attrition within the core but the bigger question is what does it mean. that is, can you kill your way to victory as the obama administration seems to think, or is it instead a much more resilient organization. >> these affiliates, you say, you suggest, had a great 2013.

obviously we were not happy about that. but explain. how did they have a good 2013? >> i think any way you measure it, it's a movement that's both growing and also one that's inflicting a lot of carnage in areas of the world where it's active ranging from iraq, where almost 8,000 people were killed, the highest death toll since the height of the civil war back in '06 to '07. to syria, where you have a growing civil war. al qaeda affiliated organizations are playing a bigger role and even controlling cities in the north. then going down to somalia, where last year, the al qaeda affiliate there, shabaab, was announced as being defeated but this year carried out a devastating strike at the mall in nairobi after carrying out smaller attacks. >> so many americans died fighting for fallujah and ramadi. how is it that al qaeda in iraq has been able to establish beachheads there and overtake those towns, or almost overtake those towns? >> they have been steadily

growing over the past few years since the u.s. withdrew from iraq. but in this case, there was a series of sunni protest camps that got cleared out by the iraqi military. first reports are often unreliable, but what i'm gathering from my sources and also from the regional media is that the local affiliate, the islamic state of iran, had planned an offensive in advance and when the iraqi military went in to push people out of these protest camps which were not al qaeda camps, the local affiliate used the opportunity to undertake a major offensive into both fallujah and also ramadi simultaneously. >> you talked about branches in syria, there's also yemen, mali, kenya. how coordinated are all these groups? >> this is a point of a great deal of debate among analysts. some people adhere to the idea that it's basically just a brand, there isn't a great deal of coordination between the central leadership and the affiliates. others think -- >> they swear the oath and kind of go off and do their dastardly

deeds? >> precisely. the competing view is that there is decentralization of action but centralization of strategy. i tend to fall into that camp but i should say this is an area, where not enough information has been released to allow for really good open source analysis. i think that one thing analysts should be pushing for is a release of more documents that were captured, because that will give us a much better idea about how these organizations actually function together. >> we were told, i guess maybe like 2011-2012, the big threat was al qaeda in the arabian peninsula which was mainly in yemen. there have been a number of drone strikes there. how strong are they? >> there have been a number of drone strikes but one thing they have been able to do is carry out basically an assassination campaign against high level yemeni officers. this has created a great deal of attrition within the yemeni military. again, you have questions just like you do in pakistan. we know there's attrition but the question is what does the attrition mean. one thing i should point to, studies that looked at this question show for organizations

that are structured this particular way where they are clandestine and built up in a cellular manner so destroying one node doesn't bleed over into others necessarily. it's very difficult to win by purely attrition-based strategy which is what we have right now. >> terrifying and of course, aqap keep plotting to send members to this country. thank you. we appreciate it. they are a force for good in a world that can be very bad at times. today, we are hearing that five workers from doctors without borders have been detained by the syrian government for quote, questioning. they were grabbed from a home last night and have not been heard from since. the aid organization is not giving out any information on their nationalities at this point or any other details to protect their safety. last year, a syrian surgeon working for the group was killed. if you're looking for the latest vacation hot spot in this freezing weather, skip the beach, hit the vatican. apparently that's what nearly seven million people did last

year, 6.6 million attended vatican events led by pope francis in 2013. that's three times as many as visited in 2012. don't take it personally, pope benedict. sure, pope francis is drawing in bigger crowds than you and was named "times" person of the year even though he wouldn't be pope if you had not decided to retire. you were the first to leave by helicopter. that's still pretty cool. coming up in our pop lead, the british are coming, the british tv shows are coming. what to expect when we return to downton abbey sunday. ♪ humans -- even when we cross our "t's" and dot our "i's," we still run into problems. that's why liberty mutual insurance offers accident forgiveness with our auto policies. if you qualify, your rates won't go up due to your first accident. because making mistakes is only human, and so are we.

we also offer new car replacement, so if you total your new car, we give you the money for a new one. call liberty mutual insurance at... and ask us all about our auto features, like guaranteed repairs, where if you get into an accident and use one of our certified repair shops, your repairs are guaranteed for life. so call... to talk with an insurance expert about everything that comes standard with our base auto policy. and if you switch, you could save up to $423. liberty mutual insurance. responsibility. what's your policy?

welcome back to "the lead." time now for the pop culture lead. put on your finest attire and brace yourself for the witty comebacks of the dowager countess. the dames and butlers are back. downton abbey returns for its fourth season this sunday on

pbs. 24 million viewers tuned in last season and there's no indication that americans have lost their appetite for the upstairs/downstairs drama. what other shows should we be looking at for this year? let's bring in brian lowrie, tv critic for "variety." all right, give us your honest assessment. is the show past its prime? >> i don't necessarily think so. i think it had -- it did have some major changes in the third season. it had a couple of very significant characters who left the show feet first. and it comes back and it takes a little while in this new season to recover from that, but it very quickly adds a fairly meaty plot that really drives the narrative through most of the season, and i think the people who are hooked on the show and the number of characters it juggles will be hooked all over again. >> a lot of other shows coming back this month. what should we be looking for?

>> well, there's a real crush of new and returning shows, but i think among the new shows, the real standout in the bunch is "true detective" which is an hbo drama staring matthew mcconaughey, whose film career has taken off at this point. the timing could hardly be better. it's beyond the casting, it's a triple-layered mystery which is really engrossing. then after that, there's a number of other new shows, some of which are fun and mildly promising. cbs has a show called "intelligence." hbo has a new show about gay men in san francisco called "looking." there's just a tremendous breadth of tv on right now and this month is just going to add to that. >> what about the ones coming back, not the new shows, but returning shows? what should we be looking out for? what's in good shape or bad shape? go ahead and unleash.

>> well, i think "girls" returns on hbo and i think that's a show that's been overrated and overappreciated kind of from the beginning, and it feels very much that way with the third season in that it feels like a lot more of the same. then fox's "the following" which was a show that i really liked the first three or four episodes, then i thought creatively just went off the rails by the end of the season, comes back for a second season, and i've seen the first couple and it looks like it's just sort of picking up unfortunately where it left off. >> with netflix and amazon prime, more cable networks, do you think tv is getting better or was the heyday maybe a few years ago and now it's kind of sliding down or coasting? >> i think we're really at a point right now, we have lost some major shows recently. "breaking bad" ended its run pretty spectacularly just a few months ago.

but we're in a real heyday of television dramas, certainly. and we've seen some strides in comedy as well. it's tougher i think for the comedy to make that kind of noise. but as you said, with channels or really not even channels, like netflix and amazon prime and hulu all trying to brand themselves by adding these prestigious shows, we are seeing a tremendous glut of things that are worth watching. when i was trying to put a year end list together of ten best, i couldn't cap it at ten. i really had a couple of dozen who i could make an argument for being on there one way or another. that's a pretty deep bench of good shows. >> i know you weren't even including news shows in your top ten list because of course, of course, i can think of one that might have made the list. thank you so much. we always appreciate it. it's a broadway show that literally stumbled out of the gate with actors getting injured and cost overruns that would make washington say wow.

it rebounded for a 1200 performance run but now they are turning the lights off on "spiderman." the show's final performance takes place tomorrow before production moves to las vegas. it will go down as the most expensive broadway production in history and one of the most buzz-worthy for its dangerous stunts and special effects, and for songs written by bono and the edge. the show is also being immortalized by the smithsonian which will induct the star's costume into the museum of american history. if you have seen "her" starring joaquin phoenix or just the previews, you know that flood pants are the clothes of the near future or future, really hard to tell what year this movie is set in. you can be the latest trendsetter. the clothing company outdoor ceremony has created a "her" collection inspired by the movie. not only can you get the pants, but you can also get shirts and coats, although i'm of course still waiting for the clothing collection inspired by the film

"space balls." make sure to follow me on twitter and check out our show page at cnn.com/thelead. that's it for "the lead." i'm jake tapper. happy friday. happy new year. i now turn you over to jim acosta, who is filling in for wolf blitzer in "the situation room." happening now, deep freeze. temperatures plunge well below zero across the midwest and northeast. as millions struggle to dig out from a vicious nor'easter. plus, pleas for clemency. what does nsa leaker edward snowden think about the growing support for his return to the united states? his legal advisor is here to respond. and hitting the slopes. russian president vladimir putin hits the slopes hoping to convince the world the winter olympics will be safe. wolf blitzer is off today. i'm jim acosta. you're in "the situation room." first, a massive nor'easter